Discipleship requires humility.
Why? Because Jesus. (To use the grammatically incorrect but common phrasing.) Because this is exactly how Jesus made disciples, and He expects us to make disciples the same way as He did. Consider two key events in Jesus discipling His followers. The more compelling of the two happened on the night He was betrayed as He shared the Passover meal with His disciples.
So when he had washed their feet and taken his outer clothing and reclined at table again, he said to them, “Do you understand what I have done for you? You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and you speak correctly, for I am. If then I—your Lord and Teacher—wash your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that just as I have done for you, you also do. Truly, truly I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you understand these things, you are blessed if you do them.” (John 13:12–17)
This is His key example for His disciples - the lasting image before the Cross. They will continue His ministry of making disciples who make disciples with the humble attitude of a servant washing someone else's dirty feet. The Jews considered this task too demeaning even for Jewish slaves - only foreign slaves would be made to do this. Jesus says that His model of disciplemaking is something so humble that it's lower in stature than something they considered too demeaning for a slave.
He finishes by saying that if we do this voluntarily, we are blessed. How crazy upside-down is that? No matter how you turn this and twist this, you can't escape that the Jesus way of making disciples requires humility.
The second example is a teaching He gave to His disciples:
And Jesus called them to himself and said to them, “You know that those who are considered to rule over the Gentiles lord it over them, and their people in high positions exercise authority over them. But it is not like this among you! But whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be most prominent among you must be the slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:42–45)
The key phrase for me here is "It is not like this among you!" He didn't say that it shouldn't be or that we should avoid it. He said that it is not that way. Our "system" or manner of making disciples will not be making disciples if it's not like this - like servanthood. Not even Jesus came to be served but to be a servant to others.
Making a disciple is serving them with such a humble attitude of service that it is more humble than that of a slave. We cannot make disciples the Jesus way if we have an attitude of superiority, as if we're better than the one we disciple, or that we're their spiritual "hero." The Jesus way of making disciples requires humility.
For those who refuse to intentionally make disciples because they don't feel qualified or good enough, there's good news! You've got a lot of the humility required already! Now, that sense of inadequacy comes from a model of discipleship that expects the discipler to be the superior one, the "expert." But it is not that way with you. Now, all you have to do is turn that humility into the attitude of a servant with respect to someone else's discipleship. Every follower of Jesus can be a discipler of others, and the ones who think themselves pretty special are the least qualified.
If we don't grab onto this last truth of the D17, then the entire 16 truths before this one will not be effective. Humility is non-optional. We cannot make disciples with pride, arrogance, or even a sense of superiority. We can only make authentic disciples of Jesus by being more humble than First Century Jewish slaves.
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